Jake Mason and the Human

Me and Natalie Fight

Jake
I got the Iris Message half way through my shower. Thankfully, I was quick enough to jump to my towel before Kayla could see me naked.

"Hey, Jake," she said, like she was trying to contain an inordinate amount of anxiety. I could see Natalie's house in the background. Kayla must have been using her hose.

"Is everything okay? Where's Natalie?"

"Yeah, things are fine. We need you to come back to the house. Bring Chiron if you can."

I gave a bitter laugh. "Yeah, I don't think that's going to happen. Natalie is pretty much his last priority for some reason."

Kayla sighed. "That's fine. You should get here soon. Come with a shirt and pants on."

I couldn't help but smile at that. "Yeah, I was planning on it."

The image of Kayla was gone and I began to dry off.

What could possibly have happened to require me? Did Natalie ask for me to come? Was there a monster attack? Or was it a trap?

Either way, I wasn't even going to bother with looking for Chiron. I wanted to get there quickly.

I made a stop at my cabin to grab a few of my latest inventions to test them out.

What I really needed to take was my bow staff that could turn into a scooter. I hadn't actually tried it out yet, but I figured this was as good a time as any.

It got the job done. It took me a while to find my way through the woods, but once I was out I had no problems. Using my scooter may have looked weird, but I got there in twice the speed than when I had walked.

When I got to the house Natalie was sitting on her front porch, kicking at the ground.

"Hey," I called, contracting my scooter.

She looked up and smiled. "Long time no see."

I shrugged as I stood next to her. "I just couldn't stay away."

That got a laugh out of her. "I have that affect on people." She stood and turned towards the house.

"Oh brother."

"Speaking of brother," she mumbled monotonously, "my cousin is here to talk to you."

"Oh," I said, shocked. Embarrassingly enough, I thought Dave wanted to talk to me because me and Natalie ha been hanging out. Don't ask why, it just came to me.

I held out my bow staff. "I should put this away."

She waved a hand. "Don't worry about it. He'll be able to handle it."

I gave a laugh as I hid it behind the bushes by her door. "What, are weapons a commodity in your family?"

"You'd be surprised," she muttered, stepping into the house.

I didn't know what she meant by the comment, but I could tell something was terribly wrong when I walked in on Kayla interrogating Dave in Natalie's kitchen.

"Where are you from?" she was demanding. Dave was sitting casually in one of the kitchen chairs with amusement washed over him as Kayla leaned on the table, trying to get in his face.

"I'm being serious. I'm from Detroit."

She shook her head and leaned closer. "No, there is no camp in-"

"Hey, Nat," Dave interrupted with a grin.

"Hey, Jake's here," Natalie stated, stepping to the side.